One Man and his Dog...

When I got downstairs this morning, David was sitting on the sofa with Lola.  Both snoozing.  Looks like the not allowed on sofa rule was made to be broken.

Lola has been a wee star today.  Coming to her name call (most of the time :) and barking when she wants outside to do her business.  We're also getting better at recognising the other signs she gives us when she wants out.  She's also been chewing the furniture less and going to get a chew toy when we ask her to.  She even brought one of her favourite toys over to me this morning so we could play together.  

After a week getting familiar with the garden, we let her off the lead this morning.  She has established her toileting area and has been round the rest of it so thought she would feel comfortable and not spooked.  How right we were.  She loved it, zooming about all over the place.  It was a joy watching her explore and discover lots of new things.  She found a pine cone and barked at it then played with it for ages but the most exciting thing EVER was a clump of monbretia.  She literally launched herself at it and was going wild!  It was like cat nip to a cat!

She was right in the middle of it and we couldn't see her, just see all the leaves and flowers moving about.  David pulled her out half a dozen times (I was scared the long leaves out cut her or get in her eyes) but she just went straight back in again!  It tired her out though and she slept for about 4 hours this afternoon before going out and doing it all over again.

We also had another  training victory as she's been barking like mad every time we open the dishwasher.  Shona advised yesterday that anytime she barks at an object we've to show that object "big love" so she gets the message that it's nothing to be frightened of.   

Last night as I loaded the dishwasher she was barking at it again, so I was stroking the dishwasher baskets and repeating over and over "lovely dishwasher, good dishwasher, what a lovely dishwasher" and feeling like a total numpty.  Well it worked!  Dishwasher's been open half a dozen times today and she didn't bat an eyelid :D  

We were supposed to be visiting friends for dinner tomorrow night but there's no way we could leave her for that amount of time, so they're coming to us instead.  Should be an interesting night :-))